Pics!

What a gorgeous day! We spent the day at the zoo, but as usual, there was nothing to see. Our zoo stinks, seems like the animals are always so far away that you can't take their picture...or they're sleeping, all rolled up in a ball under a rock or something. Can you tell I'm not a fan of our zoo? 95% of the animals are brown so they blend into those rocks and dead grass pretty well. We have a prairie dog exhibit. Come on now.

The big kids started school last Thursday and so far are really happy with their teachers. Kylie's school is way, way under populated and on the verge of being shut down, I fear. Oh well, it was bound to happen. The school is falling apart anyway.


Kylie, first day of grade 8. Last year I couldn't get her to comb her hair when she got up in the morning. Now she has to get up early to trowel her makeup on.


Jacob, first day of grade 5. We freezer-paper stencilled the shirt with a tie that reads "epic", his favourite word. Things are either "awesomely epic" or "epic fail" in his books. Nothing in-between.

Sam starts preschool on the 13th. I don't think she needs it, per se...I don't think any kid 'needs' preschool, but she is incredibly social and it's driving my nuts. Do you have any idea how hard it is to be anti-social and introverted like myself when you have a kid who is the complete opposite?!? So she will go to preschool to fill that need she has to be with other kids. I can stay if I want, or I can use that time to shop or exercise or whatever. Two hours, two mornings a week.

I'm going to start working Mondays soon, a full day. The opportunity came up and I really like the work so I thought I should take it. Turns out the office is closing for two whole months this winter so I guess I should make some money while I can :( .

Later, taters.

Stuff I did...and stuff...

Wow, did I impress you with my language skills with that stellar title?? See, I've been gone from blogging for so long that I have no imagination when it comes to titles.


I originally thought I would scrapbook the 740 pictures that we took in Maui last year but I honestly can't stand scrapbooking. Too much farting around with little fiddly bits, so I bought this frame on a clearance rack for $12 and filled it with our favourite pictures. It hangs in our dining room. Did I already post this??




I know I've posted pictures before of the kids planting flowers from seed using those little window planters and peat pellets, but can you believe that this is the first year that it actually worked? Impatiens generally love the shade in my front yard, but the giant spruces are gone so we are now dealing with full sunshine. I'm surprised these lasted as long as they have. I rescued that watering can from the neighbour's trash ha ha.




I don't like cartoon scrubs for work, but I liked these fabrics: Moda sock monkeys from Etsy and some fabric we bought in Maui. The shirt is purchased from Wal Mart, I sew a new panel over the front and then cut the original front panel out. I'm far too lazy to fit a made-from-scratch shirt at this point. I can't actually wear the sock monkey one because it's too big now, but someday I'll get around to altering it.



Invader Zim drawstring backpack for Kylie. Tutorial here:
drawstring backpack and stencil here: Deviant Art . I used freezer paper to make the stencil...if you are unfamiliar with this, it's this: stencil tutorial .


Dress for Sam, made with a free pattern from Fiddlehead and fabric bought in Maui for $5 a metre.

Today I'm repainting the wrought iron railing on the front stairs...what an ordeal! I don't know whose bright idea it was to make those things with all those funky little curves and divots that I have to sand. But it's been here since the 50's so it's cool and I bet it will look awesome when it's done.

Later, taters.

Pics.

Scott, wearing Sam's sock monkey hat from a previous year's costume. Darnit, I hope I didn't misplace that costume...it took me forever to put together!

Sammy Sunshine as a pink princess for Halloween, made from a Disney Cinderella pattern. I hate those stupid Big 3 patterns, they never fit right. Honestly, I had to cut about 6 inches off the bottom...what a waste.

Jake's 9th birthday cake. He told me how to put the icing on, what colours to use, etc., and then he added the army men. I think he did a pretty good job :) .

I haven't added pictures in a while...quite honestly, Facebook is so much easier. But I like the record that this blog gives me. Whatevs.

I think we are stuck at home today. I wish a certain someone would call and invite us out, but I doubt that's going to happen...and I'm tired of inviting myself. So today's activities consist of laundry, floors, and maybe a trip to the library. I really need to book myself a night off to work on those freezer-paper stencils but even then...not something I can work on in the bedroom or the basement so I'm not sure that will ever happen. God I'm negative today lol!

Busy week....

Waiting for the drywall guy to come. He's actually one of Scott's very-good friends...the kind of guy who's good at EVERYTHING, including cooking, so I'm now very aware that my cooking skills suck and that he will be here for dinner tonight...

My baby :) . It's always, "Take my picture, mum!"

First ride of the year. The other day I was sort of mad because of something Kylie did and I turned to speak to her in a stern manner (ok, I was going to yell) and then I realized as I looked at her right beside me: she's nearly as tall as I am!!! How in the hell did that happen?? She's 11 years old and 5'4" . She's going to be ten feet tall by the time she's 16.

Starting our seedlings. I love these little boxes, they hold 24 peat pellets and I just figured out that I can stack them on my kitchen window sill, so I can buy 2 more! Woohoo! We planted 2 kinds of pumpkins, some petunias and some black violas. Kylie was supposed to save room in hers for some impatiens for the front yard, but she went a little crazy with the black violas instead. My house is not a raging mess right now, all of that stuff piled behind Kylie is going into the basement bathroom eventually...getting a bit tired of the giant shower stall box in my tiny dining room!

Two bikinis for Sam. Top piece is from a made-by-me pattern: Moda sock monkeys is finished with fold-over elastic and the other top is the very last scraps of the beautiful fat quarter that my bloggy friend Spacestitch sent me last year. I even had to piece it together, if you look closely you'll see a little seam running down the very front lol. The bottoms are both store-bought swim diapers...I can't be bothered to sew that stuff from scratch anymore. The red one was $3 at a consignment store and the blue one was Jake's when he was a toddler :) . I was going to add a ruffle, but figured that Sam needed one diaper that would fit under her one piece suits. Oh, side note: we've started swimming lessons one morning a week and Sam *hates* it. Not that she hates being in the pool, she's just two and those people like doing their own thing lol. Listen to the teacher, are you kidding me???

Later, taters :)

**photobucket is being funky today, hopefully that giant red swim diaper will be resized when I look at this tomorrow!!

Pics.

Yay! Going to Hawaii, going to Hawaii!!!!! Scared crapless of flying, but oh well.


Watching TV in a box lol. They played with that box for days...it was a spaceship, a car, a club house, a bed. The inside is completely covered with crayon, with just a touch on the outside.


Zombiebot, from the book Crobots . Poor guy, he's definitely seen better days. I still have to finish another robot and the Hello Kitty changepurse...just don't feel like it right now. The plumber is coming in the next couple of days to plan out the basement bathroom so I need to declutter that corner. Ooooh, treasure hunting :D . I'm sure after a few hours of that I'll feel like crocheting again.


Three dish sponges, each measuring around 4"x5" . A skein of self-striping cotton yarn makes 3 of them. Crochet a rectangle, alternating sc and hdc, fold in half then sc around the whole thing.

Body Parts...

This is how Scott and I spent Valentine's Day: He sat on the couch watching TV, holding my yarn, while I sat in the chair crocheting. How romantic lol.


By the end of the weekend, I had this much finished: a load of body parts, which will end up being 2 robots, 2 changepurses and a lemur. I was able to get a good portion done while we watched Zombieland. Aren't you so proud, I didn't even fall asleep!! I thought I was incapable of sitting through an entire movie!


Domo change purse for Kylie's friend. It has a zipper and is lined with Moda sock monkeys fabric. I thought: if you were to open up a Domo, what would you find in its tummy? Sock monkeys seems perfectly reasonable. I'm not really happy with him...he looks kind of grade-school, know what I mean? But I filled him with pink chocolate hearts and a strawberry lip balm to make up for his ugly-ness.


Jacob's lemur. So many little parts...I'm not sure that I would do a guy like this again.

I hope to finish 2 robots tonight...there's a lot of embroidery, though, so maybe not until next week's post lol.

Jake's Duct Tape Wallet

Jake is going through this creative phase, where he wants to craft and bake a lot. Anyone who knows Jake will tell you..."wow, that's not like Jake at all!" lol. But it's cool, and I'll never turn down a crafting opportunity with my boy :) .

Jake heard about duct tape wallets from his friend so on a recent trip to Home Depot, he chose some red tape. I picked up a roll of black for myself, because I was silly enough to leave my previous roll laying on the counter, and someone used it to tape empty cereal boxes together to make a robot...to tell the truth, my duct tape is normally stored in my underwear drawer with all of my other precious items. Clear, black and white tape are always on hand. Always.

Anyhoo...we found the instructions to make our wallet
HERE . We added a clear ID pocket and a zippered coin pocket.

Step one, creating the duct tape 'fabric'

...after much folding and taping, here is the inside of the finished wallet...

...and the outside.

Scott helped Jake add the letters and the flames. Turned out pretty cool, don't ya think? I asked Jake to make me a hot pink one for Mother's Day. I hope he remembers :D .

Crochet. And stuff.

This is Rick. Rick is a corporate zombie, from the book Creepy Cute Crochet . I borrowed it from the library, but I really, really want this book for keepsies. Rick is my first crochet project ever, and as soon as I opened this book and saw the instructions I knew I had to make him for Cori, my bloggy friend. Because she appreciates the finer things in life, like zombies. Crocheted zombies eat Polly Pocket brains, did you know that? Poor Polly...she didn't even see it coming :( .


This guy is a Cthulhu , which is some sort of mythical creature, from the same book. I know what you're thinking...you're thinking, "could you please use that word in a sentence?"...to which I would say, "Oh no, there's a cthulhu in the cookie jar!" .

I've also been working on some crocheted 'sponges': that's one thing that I've really wanted to end my addiction to, those stupid Dollarama dish sponges with a scrubby on one side. I know they will probably outlive humanity in a landfill somewhere, and that has always bugged me. So I have been frantically crocheting double-thickness, four-inch square "sponges" with a skein of cotton yarn from Wal Mart. No, I don't like crocheted dish cloths. I don't like how floppy they are. I like that a sponge just sits in my hand and doesn't flop all over the place. They're working out really well, I'm pretty happy with the way they've turned out. I can't show you a pic, because I've used them all now and they don't look half as pretty as when I first made them lol.


Ponyo noodles, as Kylie calls them. We went to see Ponyo a few weeks ago, and now Kylie is obsessed with ramen noodles cooked in those covered bowls (am I the only one that didn't know that you pour boiling water over ramen in these bowls, put the cover on, and then in a few minutes you have cooked noodles???) . Anyway, we had to run all over Chinatown looking for these bowls. Yes, we tried T&T and they were out. Anyway, Kylie is using the cheater chopsticks because she was super hungry and didn't have the patience to fart around with the usual chopsticks.

Felt food finished.

I had a few more things that I wanted to complete before Sam's second birthday next month...maybe I can finish it for Sam's 3rd birthday???


Breakfast.


Lunch...a tasty sandwich with baby carrots and strawberries on the side.


Biggest carrots in the entire world for a snack...


...and salad for supper. This is to counter-act all of the cookies and cupcakes that I made last summer.

I wish I was a better picture-taker-er, but I'm not. Something to work on :) .

Some sewing...

I just don't have any sewing gumption anymore. So what did I do? I went out and bought some yarn and some crochet hooks lol. I'm going to figure it out if it kills me.





Jacob and I made a guitar bag for his electric guitar. It has a wide shoulder strap on the back, so he can throw it on his back when it's time for lessons in the fall. Jacob traced the guitar onto the back of some Christmas gift wrap, we added a couple of inches all around and then cut it out of some thick denim. Jacob top-stitched the strap and help to design the pockets. I put in the zipper and did the rest of it. There are 2 pockets: one for the amp cord and one for his picks.


Jacob needed a tie for a wedding (the skulls tie), and Kylie just wanted a tie (the checkered one). They are skinny ties, maybe 2" across. Not even. I was thinking of posting a tute...I just don't feel like it right now. Maybe when the big kids are back in school.

FINALLY...back to school shopping is over. Army & Navy was advertising some Puma knock-offs in their flyer, so we went there this morning to get some for Kylie...who knew there would be ladies lined up in the parking lot for these shoes??? We got the last pair, and thank God they fit Kiki!!! Those shoes were sold out in less than 5 minutes. There were ladies arguing over House of Dereon shoes...honestly, this store is full to the brim with bargain basement junk, and once in a while they get some name-brand designer stuff and ladies go absolutely nuts for it. Jacob found some jeans and shoes at Wal Mart that he liked, and now we are set.

Jacob is having a friend sleep over tonight, and we went swimming today so everyone was fast asleep by 9pm. Scott is asleep on the couch...I should send him off to bed.

Night, all!

Beanbag Chairs

It is so frustrating to get anything done around here lately...total of two sewing machines and one serger, and they all need to be serviced!!! Argh!!! I'm toying with the thought of buying a new machine, but I'm had the same one for 24 years and I just don't think they make them the same as they used to.

Anway, two beanbag chairs made from this tutorial . And they were made super-duper cheap:

• $12 total including zippers and fabric for the outer bag (there is an inner and outer bag for each chair)
• inner bags were made from 2 old queen-size sheets that I had stuck in the back of my linen closet
• the beans were found for free online: if you Google ground expanded polystyrene beads (ground EPS) in your area, you may find a business in the industrial area of your town that is just begging to give away the biggest friggin' bags of the junk you've ever seen. Really, with all of the seats down in my minivan, I could only fit *2* of these things in. It's so messy, though...my gosh, that junk flys everywhere!!!

Kylie wanted to help with this project, but she's just getting to that age where nothing is as fun as hanging out with her freinds. Oh, well lol.

Kylie's chair is some sort of sparkly pink/purple lycra from Fabricland's clearance section. Jake's chair is seersucker (much, much easier to sew than the lycra!) .

Now to go clean up the mess that Kylie and I made in the garage when we filled the chairs with EPS...

More Easter pics

Did I post this pic before??? I don't think so. I loved, loved, loved this fabric when I first bought it, and trimmed it with a brown polka-dot fabric to match the big brown dots...now it's a touch crazy for my tastes. And my sister pointed out that it was a bit pysanka-ish, so perfect for an Easter dress lol!





This is Uncle Terry, Scott's brother, colouring eggs with Jacob. He's such a cool uncle...always has time to play with Jacob, when some people forget that the poor little guy even exists :( . Jacob lubs him to pieces. He's such a cool uncle that he brought this for my kids for Easter:







Yes, that's right: an entire case of Cream Eggs, and an entire case of Mini Eggs. He works at a warehouse and got a good deal or something...anyway, it's all in the freezer now to go into lunches. It should carry Jake into junior high, right? Jacob is still saying, "Mom, remember when Uncle Terry brought us all that chocolate? Remember?" . Yes, buddy, it was just 2 days ago...


I don't remember if I posted this before, either...Uncle Terry's old Spiderman t-shirts upcycled into a cozy blanket for Jacob. Jacob wouldn't let me wash it for a while, because he said it "smelled like Uncle Terry". Goofball kid lol.

Random Stuff

Kylie's book stash for the week: 18 Fruit Basket books plus some others. When she saw them all at the library, in the hold section with her name on them, she giggled, jumped up and down and clapped lol. Silly kid. At school today, a Native Elder is coming to give a presentation on tradition...Kylie has informed me that she is angry that she is not Korean, Chinese or Japanese and will forever hold it against me. The kids were asked to wear traditional dress to school, if they had some...so Kylie wore her qipao as a form of protest. Again, it's all my fault so I guess she is protesting against me??? LOL.





Jacob, smelling the laundry. I bought a new fabric softener, just because Superstore was out of our regular stuff. I think it's too stinky, but Jacob really likes it.





My mom has this really great shopping bag that clips on to her purse and it opens up into a good-size shopping bag...but I just can't find the right fabric to copy it.





This nylon is just a touch thicker, so it doesn't fold down as small as I would like, but it's still an ok size. Still a work in progress! I will get it down smaller, I swear!

Ugh, I'm so tired...in January I went for a physical and blood work (just annual stuff) and just yesterday, the dr called me to tell me that I am really, really low in Vitamin D. Apparently, this can cause a person to feel exhausted, which would explain the need to nap every afternoon! I blame it on this extended winter we're having. The other day we woke up to -40C temps! Unreal!